Set Me Free
by KaiFukugawa
Summary: When Sherlock "comes back from the dead", things go back to normal. Well, almost. No one was sure how it happened. All they knew was that one day a girl came into their lives. A girl who was at first thought to be an enemy. A girl with bright blue eyes. A girl with a past that haunts her... And suddenly they were in over their heads. Sherlock/OC


As Sherlock watched John walk away, a strange feeling gripped him. A slight frown appeared on his face.

Having no one else to talk to and not daring to speak aloud, he gritted his teeth. Oh it was frustrating having to watch his friend walk away!

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't force himself to blame anyone but himself.

He loved John. Not in the way others thought, but as a friend, well, John was as good as you could get. And, no matter how hard it was for him to admit, he missed him and wanted to tell him that it was all a lie. That it was all going to go back to the way it was before.

However, it was easier said than done. Then there was the problem of the police. They had a bit of a bone to pick with him.

He was positive Lestrade would welcome him back. But Anderson and Donovan?

There was a sort hierarchy in his mind.

Lestrade, John, and him were at the top.

And there, at the very bottom, were Donovan and Anderson.

But bottom or not, their opinions mattered to the Detective Inspector (for reasons he could not fathom why). He had never let that get in his way before though. But this was different.

And he had used think that different was good. In most cases it was. In this case, however, it was not.

He missed John. He needed someone to sort out these seemingly meaningless feelings in his mind- what were they called?

Ah, feelings yes.

And John was the best at sorting them out.

He needed a case. He needed a smoke. And he needed John.

The detective briefly flashed back to when he was working in the lab and had created a mini explosion. He had been so drugged up after that that he couldn't even walk. He remembered how John had taken care of him, made sure he was comfortable even when he was acting like a child.

Thinking of times like that only made him want to see his friend more.

But he had to do it to keep him safe-

To keep him safe.

_To keep him safe._

What was wrong with that sentence?

_To keep him safe from Moriarty. _Sherlock repeated the sentence to himself. Something was wrong with it.

_To keep him safe from-_

Moriarty was dead.

The detective had seen it himself, and not even Moriarty could be that clever.

Brilliant.

By the time he had deduced all this, John was long gone. But that wasn't a problem.

Sherlock always liked making dramatic entrances.

* * *

"Mrs. Hudson, please stop crying," John sighed, his voice hoarse.

"I-I'm sorry dear. It's just-"

The old woman burst into tears yet again.

John felt the familiar sting in the back of his eyes.

_Sherlock, you idiot. Do you see what happens when you leave? Everything falls apart._

The army veteran refused to use the word "dead" to describe what had happened to his best friend. Because, in truth, he refused to believe that Sherlock Holmes was dead.

It was impossible. Sure, Sherlock was human; he had to die eventually. But the Sherlock he knew would never-_never_- admit that he was wrong, _especially _if he was on the brink of death.

Why would Sherlock have lied like that?

What could _make_ him lie like that?

Something wasn't right.

A buzz in his pocket broke him out of his silent reverie.

"H-hello?" he asked uncertainly.

"Hello, John. It's Lestrade. I know that you're still recovering from Sherlock's...passing, but I was wondering if you would like to...er... I was wondering if you could stop by and check out a body that we just got in... It's okay if you don't-"

"No... It's fine, Lestrade... I-I think it would help me heal a bit. After all, I can't stay away forever I guess."

John attempted to laugh, but it came out as a choke.

After a pathetic attempt at small talk, he hung up, dropping Mrs. Hudson off at the flat before driving to the address that Lestrade had texted him.

"John!" Lestrade said, seeming genuinely happy to see him despite the mishap before Sherlock had..._passed_.

He smiled slightly, even waved a bit at his old friends from the squad.

"Well, shall we take a look at him then?" he asked, referring to the body.

"Ah yes... Right this way."

Everyone tried to be as happy as possible, but the mood was so melancholy that one could almost see the darkness in the air. Even Donovan and Anderson didn't say anything. Without Sherlock, all of them were lost.

* * *

"Hm, yes. Well it seems that the, uh, blow to the back killed him. Made very deeply and sloppily, possibly by an axe. Obviously the murderer wasn't very skilled with it. And um..."

Damn it. Sherlock would've been able to see so much more in this! There was something he was missing. Something that only Sherlock could pick up.

He could sense the tension in the room. It was suffocating.

"Anyway, um, the cut was obviously made by some sort of blade-"

"Yes, very observant John. However, you're missing something, something very important. Now think. What is it? Tell me."

Everyone went still.

John was afraid to turn around in case he was just imagining it.

"Good Lord, it must be so _boring_ inside of your tiny little heads! Anderson leave the room, your massive ego is choking me."

There was an unsteady silence before anyone said anything.

"Why you- I swear Sherlock Holmes!"

There was a hearty laugh and then a confused pause.

"John, my friend, why on _earth _are you just sitting there? Don't you want to say something?"

Slowly, he turned around.

And standing there, in all his glory, was Sherlock Holmes.

His dark brown curls were a bit wilder than usual, hinting that he hadn't had time to worry about his appearance for a while.

His pale blue eyes sparkled with amusement and something else.

Relief?

Happiness?

John wasn't sure how to interpret it. Sherlock showing any emotions was either a good thing or a very, very bad thing. From experience, he was leaning toward the latter.

Hardly thinking, he leapt to his feet.

There was a loud cry of astonishment as his fist connected with Sherlock's face.

The detective groaned loudly, cradling his cheek.

"What the bloody hell Sherlock! What in the world were you thinking?! I- you know what I'll..."

"You'll what John?"

A smile danced on Sherlock's lips. Oh, he was enjoying this. Not the pain that is- seeing John flustered.

His shorter friend hugged him awkwardly.

"Lord. What did you... Why...?"

The detective smirked a bit. He wasn't one for gloating, but him coming out on top in his battle with Moriarty was making him act a tad cocky.

"Moriarty, John."

The blonde man chuckled quietly.

"Isn't that always the problem."

"It would seem so."

"But...how?" John asked, now serious again.

There was no easy way to put it, so Sherlock decided to tell it as it was, something that he was very good at.

"He threatened to kill the only three friends I ever had. Said that he'd only let off if I...jumped and finished his story: Sherlock Holmes the fake genius. Before I could do anything, he killed himself. Stuck the gun in his mouth and shot himself straight through the head, the loon. Only if his people saw me jump would they not shoot. And seeing as their master had just died...well the odds weren't looking good. So I jumped. The night before, I had figured that I was going to die. I had Molly help me with my fake suicide. The rest is...well, I won't bore you with the petty details."

A solemn darkness filled the silence. Moriarty had been sick. He had needed help. Perhaps if they had gotten to him sooner this wouldn't have happened.

"Sherlock."

Both men jumped, having forgotten that they weren't alone.

"I'm sorry for doubting you," Lestrade said with a gulp, his voice a bit hoarse from unshed tears.

Sherlock gave a slight grin to the older man.

"It's okay. He made everyone doubt. That was his job after all. He was an expert at it. Now quickly, if you hurry you can find the murderer. He should be just down the street."

"I'm not even going to ask how you knew that."

"It's best you don't. Now go!"

* * *

_Five months later_

The door shut behind John with a soft click.

"I asked you for that pen," Sherlock called.

"Hm? When?"

"Two and a half hours ago."

"You just keep talking when I'm gone, don't you?"

"Yup."

"Sherlock Holmes, I swear."

"You swear what?"

John was about to answer when the door opened.

"Excuse me dears, but Mr. Lestrade is here to see you two!" Mrs. Hudson chirped.

Sherlock kept his eyes on the blank telly and sighed.

"Bring him in."

Lestrade appeared behind the old woman and waved slightly.

"Hello Sherlock. John."

John waved back. "Hi."

"What have we got this time Lestrade? Murder? Suicide?"

The Detective Inspector grimaced a bit.

"Not exactly."

He set a file down on the table.

Sherlock inspected it nonchalantly.

_Manilla folder. Name on the tab indicating that it might be someone's profile. Obviously Lestrade wouldn't be bringing it to us if it were someone who he fancied to have a cup of tea with. In that case, probably a criminal and a wanted one judging by the state of the folder. Probably serious. Rating out of ten: none so far._

Lestrade began to reach for the folder, taking a breath before he began: "I need your help with-"

Sherlock cut him off midsentence and grabbed the file off of the table.

"Rin Takeshima, according to the name on the tab. Must be a person, probably a criminal considering that you're the one that brought it to us, most likely wanted by the state that the file is in. He's of Japanese descent I'm guessing?"

Lestrade gingerly took the folder from him, as if afraid it was going to explode.

"Yes, but I would appreciate it if you two kept this between us."

"What part?"

"What?"

"You said yes. What part was I right on."

"You were spot on..."

"Brilliant!"

"... Except for the fact that Rin Takeshima is a _she_."

"A _she_?! A she! Ugh, there's always something!"

"Yes...so anyway-"

"A she!"

Lestrade cleared his throat. Sherlock shut up.

"_Anyway_, as Sherlock said, she comes from a Japanese decent. Her father, Izuru, is Japanese while her mother, Margaret, is British. And...well, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves."

He flipped open the files. Sherlock looked at the pictures boredly. John couldn't have been more surprised.

He had expected someone rugged and dangerous looking. Someone with a sly smirk on their face, maybe some red lipstick on. He had expected someone tall and curvy.

But what he saw couldn't have been farther from the truth.

There was picture upon picture.

The first things he noticed were two pairs of bright blue eyes. Eyes so bright that they made Sherlock's seem white. They were a shade lighter than the color of the sky and glowed like neon. The second thing he noticed was that the other pair of eyes belonged to a dog.

One picture was of a small girl, maybe seven, clutching flowers to her chest with a surprised look on her face, as if she had just realized that her picture was being taken. The next one showed that same girl a few years later, smiling sneakily, as if she were sharing a secret with someone. After that was a picture of the girl when she was about fourteen, hanging out with a few of her mates. The next picture was different from all the others though. It was taken on a bleak, sandy landscape that John recognized all too well.

_Afghanistan?_ _How...?!_

The girl was standing on a cliff overlooking a small town. This time the black dog was at her side, just a pup. The girl was obviously older; possibly four years had passed since the last picture. After that, the rest of the pictures were of her walking around London. By the looks of it they were fairly recent. It was obvious that these ones and the one from Afghanistan were taken on the sly.

In the first, she was walking on the sidewalk, black jacket pulled up around her face to block the wind. Her dog walked forward, keeping pace with her. In the next, her dog was looking at the camera, and she was gazing at the dog from the corner of her eye. After that, she spotted the camera, looking a bit surprised. Then- _she waved!_

Never had any of the people John and Sherlock had dealt with waved at a camera!

The girl herself wasn't at all what he had expected.

Her skin was tan, but not dark. It was tan like she was outside playing sports a lot. Her long black hair was pulled back in a loose braid in all of the recent pictures; in all of the older ones, her hair was down. Her bright blue eyes were hard to read, but it was obvious that she was comfortable. She wore no makeup; either she didn't want to stand out too much or she didn't like it. In all of the recent photographs, she was wearing a black trench coat with black jeans under it, partially covered by knee-high boots. She didn't look Japanese at all, and she was thin but not unhealthily so; one could tell that she was naturally svelte. On top of that, she was _short!_ She looked like she would only go to John's midshoulder! Which means that she would only go to Sherlock's..._ribs!_

Oh this would be interesting.

Then there was her dog, which, according to Lestrade, was a wolf-dog hybrid. She had sleek black fur and neon blue eyes like her master (of course her master only had hair on her head...). Now that John looked at it, he could see the wolf. He could also see it taking down a grown man as easily as it was for him to pull a trigger.

"Have you got any written information?" Sherlock asked.

"Hm? Oh, yes. Here you go."

John looked at the paper, carefully tucking it all away in his mind.

Name: Rin K. Takeshima

Full Name: Rin Kateri Takeshima

Date of Birth: April 20, 1992

Age: 21

Eye Color: Blue

Hair Color: Black

Race: Japanese/British

Gender: Female

Height: 1.53 meters (5 feet 1 inch)

Weight: 46 kilograms (102 pounds)

Blood Type: O negative

The list went on. Everything about Rin in a nutshell. Except for who she was as a person.

"The dog. What's going on with the dog?" John asked Lestrade.

"That's her dog. Apparently she picked it up right before going to Afghanistan. Seems to be well-trained."

Before John could respond, Sherlock spoke up.

"Who is she? Or should I say, what do you want with her?"

Lestrade took a breath.

"Rin Takeshima ran away from home at seventeen. She wandered around the general London area for about a year when she bought her dog, which was just a pup at the time. Soon as she bought the pup, she made the sudden decision to go to Afghanistan. After that, things were a bit jumbled. Apparently she got training for her dog from a soldier, ran around trying to play cool for a while. Right now though, she's very wanted. Only the police and the government know about it right now. The reason was... She's suspected of murder. One day a few soldiers were wandering around when they found the body of Martin Barry, a well-respected ranked soldier. He had a few bullets in him, and it looked like he was cut by a knife. We think that she killed him for knowing something. We think that she might have been tied in with Moriarty."

At the name of his old enemy, Sherlock raised his head. His mind was working a million miles an hour, starting to piece together the puzzle.

_Rating out of ten: ten._

"Okay, Lestrade. We'll take the case. I suppose you've given us all you've got? Wait, no, I _know_ that that's all you've got because you work with Anderson."

Lestrade opened his mouth to protest but immediately thought better of it.

"We were wondering if you two could try to find her. It would help us a lot. She walks near your flat every day around this time, but," Lestrade looked out the window, "I would hurry. It looks like it going to rain."

* * *

"Shall we get going?" John asked his flatmate, zipping up his jacket.

Sherlock looked at him. "Where'd Lestrade go?"

"Dear Lord Sherlock! He left twenty minutes ago!"

"Oh."

"Sherlock."

"No. You can go looking for her yourself. I have quite a bit of work here."

"What?! Work? What work?!"

But Sherlock was already locked up in his mind again. John sighed. His friend could be a real pain in the ass sometimes.

The second he left the flat, he was hit by a humid rain. Lestrade was right. A storm was brewing.

John briefly reviewed what he knew about her. He gripped his gun, which he had stored safely in his coat pocket, tighter.

It didn't take long to find her.

She was walking along the sidewalk opposite to him, eyes on the ground in front of her, smiling slightly. Her dog walking beside her, never straying away from its master.

Occasionally her eyes would flicker up and land on the face of a stranger, as if someone had called her.

People on his side of the road often stopped and gazed at her, a timid "Hey, darling! Want to spend the night at my flat? I'll treat you real fine!"

And every time she would just shake her head or give an embarrassed look to her dog.

John could see why people were stopping. She was beautiful. Not in the make-up wearing way. She seemed elegant yet uncontrollable, like a force of nature. From where he was standing, it was obvious that her trench coat was a size or two too big.

"Excuse me, gentle butterfly! Darling wouldn't you stop and have a cup of tea with me?" a man just in front of him shouted to her. She just shook her had slightly.

Slowly the sounds of flirting stopped when the men realized that the answer was going to be no.

As John looked at her, he shook his head. There were so many things she could've been in life. A doctor, an artist. But a murderer was not one of them.

There was something disconcerting about her. Something that warned John to keep his distance. It might've been the fact that she was always lost in her own world.

Or maybe it was the fact that she was highly wanted and was walking around in plain sight.

Even though Sherlock had told him numerous times that hiding in plain sight was the best disguise, he was pretty sure that she wasn't trying to disguise herself.

Did she want to get caught?

No, of course not. That would be insane.

A sigh escaped his lips. Briefly wondering if he should have brought his umbrella, he looked at the other side of the street.

The girl was looking right at him.

He paused, unsure whether to move or not. So he just stayed in place, eyes locked with hers.

After a slow, uncertain moment, she smiled slightly. And then she waved.

If John was surprised before, he was thunderstruck now. Waving? What kind of criminal waved?!

Before he could respond, she began walking again.

By the time he snapped out of his trance, he had to run to catch up to her.

He saw her dog's ears prick up, and its tail began to wag slightly.

A small child sitting outside his flat leapt to his feet and ran over to her.

"Rin! Rin!" he called.

She waved.

The boy babbled to her in a voice that he couldn't quite make out. The boy laughed as the dog licked his face.

The girl laughed and pulled an apple out of her coat. The boy squealed in delight. She ruffled his hair gently before leaving.

It amazed him. He hadn't at all expected this.

_I think I'm turning into Sherlock_, John thought with a chuckle.

Slowly the amount of people around them were dwindling down until it was only them walking.

If she knew he was there, she didn't show it. But just in case, he stayed back and let her go ahead.

The rain was almost there now. He hurried ahead to catch up to her, but she was gone.

He headed to the only place she could have gone: an abandoned building. Well, the skeleton of one. It was an old construction site by the looks of it. It might have been a building for a big business, but then for some reason, when it was halfway done, it was scrapped. Only the roof and the walls on the top half were done. But the dark shadows between the beams could have been walls themselves.

The girl was gone. Into the building.

John did the only reasonable thing to do: he followed her into the timeless dark of the building.

* * *

**A/N: First chapter done! Yay! Seemed to go a bit faster than I would've wanted it to... I think I fixed most of my mistakes... I should probably start looking for a beta... Everyone here in the Sherlock Fandom seems so mature... Woops ^^;**


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